Genaside

Secret of Sumber Hills, Part 2

Princes of the Apocalypse, Episode 2

30

APR/15

After the successful manticore hunt, the merriment continued with renewed enthusiasm. When the feast finally came to an end, the Feathergale Knights made two of their initiates’ dormitories available to the party. With the crew split, Savra came in to one group with a proposal – to join the Cult of Howling Hatred. Boult danced around the topic for a bit, before Nuria and Parzival decided to get the rest of the group from their room. After receiving a very noncommittal refusal, Savra left the party to decide in the morning.

The other leaders were less patient. Knights attacked both groups as they slept. Boult covered his room in fog to go and help the other group. Despite this cover, Nuria fell and Parzival was forced into a high corner to fend off the knights. The other crew, now with equal numbers to the cultists, fared better, as Agate took off heads with his sword, but Rowan also went down.

As reinforcements rallied in the other rooms, Boult healed Rowan, who conjured spikes into the floor to hold them off. Thurl and Braden came down the stairs and forced their minions onward anyway, demanding the party surrender or die. The spikes helped make quick work of the second wave of cultists in the main chamber, so Braden attacked himself, while Thurl teleported past the group to kidnap Nuria. Boult and Kurt chased off Braden while the others handled the remaining enemies engaging Parzival. D’vid somehow slept through all of this, and was about to be left behind.

The party frantically tried to regroup, but the sound of many footsteps coming up the stairs forced them to flee toward the roof. There, they again saw Thurl and Braden, holding a recovered Nuria over the Spire’s edge. Vulture-mounted snipers rose up to surround the roof, as well as Savra on a gryphon. It seemed for a few tense moments that the party would yield, but when Parzival made a move to rescue Nuria, Thurl struck him, causing everyone, already on edge, to react. Boult countered Braden’s defensive wind magic with a wind attack, sending him plunging off the tower, and the battle began in earnest.

After Nuria blasted him with her necrotic magic, Thurl shoved her, too, off the Spire. Daggers flew from the snipers – although Savra showed surprising reluctance to attack – and swords clashed on the roof. Soon only Boult and Parzival stood, half-dead, facing down Thurl and his riders. A desperate last strike of magic and bow put Thurl himself on the brink, just as a horde of creatures rose from the chasm to assault the Spire. The riders dove to engage there, ignoring the rooftop battle. Thurl admitted defeat as he staggered toward the center of the roof, only to make a final, sacrificial blast of thunder, tearing himself apart but throwing the whole party off the tower.

XP Award: 480 per character
No gold, downtime, renown, or magic items.